I was delighted this month to get a chance to work with former colleague, Orla Casey, from Momentum Consulting in Leitrim.

While working on the Digital Mail concept and copy writing for a fascinating food initiative event being run in the North West of Ireland, I also took care of the Press Release and Media Distribution for the event.

Check out the event brochure below, with the text samples following.

Digital Mail Copy

ORIGINAL NOTES:

Grow your profits by stocking more healthy foods and support our region!Why attend?

Opportunity to access high margin innovative foods that will strengthen your offering

Opportunity to learn about new products ready for market

Health and Wellness has become a global food trend – witness it at a local level and meet innovative Irish food suppliers

Support our region and incentivize increased “local purchasing” by working with our regional food producers

DIGITAL MAIL COPY:

Secure your children’s future, and your own profits, with the Healthy Food Initiative

Our young people are leaving us in droves, because they have no options.

CSO figures in 2015 show that over 35,000 people left Ireland this year, while it was above 40,000 the year before.

We are developing a healthy and creative food industry in counties Cavan, Leitrim, Longford and Roscommon, to ensure there are jobs and business opportunities which will not only bring substantial profits to your business’ bottom line – but also give the next generation the option to stay home.

We’re running a FREE event on Wednesday 14th October, where you can be inspired by healthy food as a driver of innovation and opportunity in your area.

Come along for the day in Drumshanbo, sample the fare, and you can explore:

Discovering new products that are ready to hit the market for high sales

Cashing in on the global food trend of Health and Wellness, at a local level

Working with innovative Irish regional food producers to increase local purchasing

Meet the folk who are safeguarding the future in our communities, secure your share of the healthy profits, and get involved at the roots of this forward-thinking support for the food industry in our region!

Press Release Copy & Distribution

On Wednesday 14th October, a free food innovation conference in County Leitrim will bring food providers and buyers together with experts, to develop counties Cavan, Longford, Roscommon and Leitrim as a healthy and creative food region.

The aim of the healthy food initiative is to secure business and tourism opportunities for the future economy of the area, while supporting local enterprise diversity and innovation. No small mission, but a valuable one.

Supported by Nourish EU, a European project which stimulates the development of food regions, the Upper Shannon Erne Future Economy Project, the Local Enterprise Offices of the region and Aurivo, the leading food co-operative embarking on innovative healthy food initiatives; this is a networking and showcase event delivering advice and expertise, but also highlighting real life case studies and providing practical solutions to the problems commonly encountered by small to medium rural enterprise.

Attendees can look forward to exploring creative ways to produce, market and distribute healthy food, while meeting like-minded entrepreneurs and buyers, and of course, sampling some of the innovative and healthy foods on offer in the region.

Fergal McPartland is Manager of the Food Hub in Leitrim, explains that their involvement with the Healthy Food event “stems from being a partner in the Nourish EU project which aims to create and develop a Healthy & Creative Food Region in our region and to encourage SME’s to innovate & develop ‘healthier food’ options for consumers.”

Joe Lowe, of Leitrim Local Enterprise Office expands on this: “We hope to assist companies to grow and to create new job & training opportunities in the process… We feel that there is a positive future for food in this region with a focus on the healthy and the innovative artisan. We also see significant potential for food tourism.”

The event programme includes a Spotlight on Distribution, Learning from Others, and focus on Financing Innovation. The end of programme reception sees the launch of Nourish EU’s ‘Irish Healthy Food Partnership Toolkit’, an Erasmus + initiative by the Chief Executive of Leitrim County Council, Frank Curran.

Food businesses, buyers and food service businesses couldn’t ask for a more pleasant location to spend a thoroughly educational and inspiring day; Drumshanbo is a beautifully preserved traditional Irish town, and home to the thriving Food Hub – tours are available in request.

Thanks to the generous sponsorship of Nourish EU, Local Enterprise Office and Aurivo Ireland, there’s no fee payable to attend the event – just book online at www.nourisheu.com/booking to secure your place and start growing profits from healthy food!

Our Lead Copywriter, Lora O'Brien, is a full time journalist and freelance feature writer for many national and international print and online publications.

What's your favourite book? A simple question, and one that most of us can answer, especially if we go back to our childhood. You may look to the left - off into the past… your eyes mist over, and a small smile breaks across your face as the title, cover image, and even the author's name come back to you.

Alongside happy childhood reminiscence and warm tinglies about certain books is a very clear desire, shared by many people worldwide, to know more about those books, their favourite characters, and particularly the authors' lives and places that inspired their writing.

Let us help you with your content writing and organisation of the perfect words for your website - for example, a piece on the death and burial of the Irish Queen Maeve...

Awww, she's Dead? How?!In her later years, Maeve often went to bathe in a pool on Inchcleraun (Inis Cloithreann), an island on Lough Ree, near Knockcroghery in County Roscommon. Furbaide, who's mother she had killed, sought revenge, and set about planning her demise. He was quite dedicated about it. But we suppose it's the type of thing that you'd really want to get right.

First, he took a rope and measured the distance between the pool and the shore, and practiced with his sling until he could hit an apple on top of a stake Maeve's height, from that distance. The next time he saw Medb bathing he put his practice to good use and killed her with a piece of cheese. Yes chees. Queen Maeve was killed by cheese. Her son, Maine Athramail (he who was originally Cairbre, and most 'like his mother', ascended to the throne of Connacht in her place.

But buried in Sligo, right?Well, not exactly. Maybe. 'Maeve's Cairn' in Co. Sligo, is the best known burial site of Queen Maeve, but it is one of three possible sites. According to some legends, she is indeed buried in the 40ft (12m) high stone cairn on the summit of Knocknarea (Cnoc na Rí in Irish, Hill of the King/Queen) in County Sligo. The story goes that she is buried upright, facing her enemies in Ulster.

In Bronze or Iron Age burials though, it would be common enough to hack an important dead person apart and bury bits of them along different boundaries, for protection and guardianship. Another story goes that she is buried in the hill of Knockma (Cnoc Medb in Irish, Hill of Maeve), near Belclare in Co. Galway, which is also where Fionnbharr, King of the Connacht Sidhe, holds court. The Fairy connection is an interesting one, and maybe related to her later associations with Mab, the Fairy Queen? The boundary theory holds here too though, as the views from the top of Knockma are spectacular. Very convenient for a guardianship position, we'd say.

Her home in Rathcroghan, County Roscommon is the third, and most likely burial site, with a long low slab named Misgaun Medb being given as the probable location. In the 'she got chopped up in bitty bits and buried' theory, this is where her soul (most likely to be contained in her head, according to thinking of the time) would be. Or possibly her heart. Whatever was deemed the most important part would have stayed at home, with other bits spreading out at lesser sites along the boundaries.